“Robert,

I am so deeply grateful to you for your help with my sound.

We got to know each other thanks to your blog, and our mutual appreciation for Tom Port’s philosophy regarding records and stereos. There are so many directions to go when it comes to reproducing music at home, and for me, it has been deeply satisfying to have found an approach that truly works. It’s even nicer to have gotten to know another sojourner along this esoteric path we’re following.

To go this route, a lot of conventional wisdom must be discarded, and a lot of prominent commentary must be ignored. I don’t blame people who think that the path we are on is just one among many. Ultimately, words posted on the internet can do little justice to the experience of listening to a White Hot stamper on a properly set up stereo. Once you hear such a thing for yourself, there’s really no other option that holds any appeal.

I had read a lot of your posts, as well as Tom’s, but it took actually visiting you in your home and sitting and listening to records together to fully grasp that you were really on to something. As you know, after my visit to you last year, I ditched all of my “standard issue” gear – my McIntosh amp, my Bowers and Wilkins speakers, my tube preamp, and replaced them with the gear you had, and that Tom recommended to you. The sound improvements I got as I went through this process were stunning, and it only confirmed for me that I was headed in the right direction and trusting the right advisors.

When you visited me this past weekend, I was expecting to share with you the sound I had gotten, thanks to you and Tom, and enjoy playing some records together. What I was not at all expecting was how much further improvement was available to me. All that potential for better sound was available in my listening room – it just took somebody with the ear to know precisely what was lacking, and the skills to know how to tap into it.

What ensued was a truly eye-opening couple of hours of listening, adjusting, and listening again.  Robert, experiencing your process was like watching an artist paint a canvas. A sequence of small choices out of which something truly beautiful emerges. If I compare what you are capable of to an artist painting a canvas, then most dudes setting up a stereo are like house painters. They may get the job done, and do so competently, but their finished product doesn’t have the nuance and detail of a painting.

When we plug in our boxes of electronics, or use a protractor to set up our cartridge, we’re functioning like house painters. When somebody with your skills and ear really gets in there and does the delicate crafting, you function like an artist. Same toolkit, totally different outcome.

Tom often writes that a good stereo setup is 20% what you bought and 80% what you’ve done with it. This is another perspective of his that I did not fully comprehend until I saw it for myself. Robert, it’s hard to put a price on the value you created by helping me adjust my stereo, but when I think of all the money spent on swapping in and out cables, preamps, amps, tweaks, and cartridges, it is a no-brainer to work with somebody who knows how to actually make all that equipment work optimally – to make it synergise and sing.

The best way I can describe the transformation you’ve wrought is that it’s like a pair of binoculars that have been brought into focus. Everybody knows that feeling. You raise up the binoculars and everything is larger, and you can make out some details you couldn’t see before. That’s what it’s like getting better gear – your music can sound bigger, and fuller and show you details you hadn’t seen before. But then, if you adjust the focus knob, it all changes. Once you dial it in just right, everything snaps into relief, and once it’s in there, it’s unmistakable, even if you didn’t know what you were missing before.

So if buying the gear is like buying the binoculars, then having someone who knows how to set it all up is like adding a focus knob. Best of all, now that I’ve seen the steps you’ve taken, and I’ve heard the finished product, I feel like I will be able to tackle it on my own in the future.

Last night my teenager came down and we listened to one song after another that we both love – Bowie, Cat Stevens, Fleetwood Mac. We just sat there together, enjoying the enthralling sound of some timeless music. I can’t thank you enough for providing that experience.”

Aaron B.